Saturday, June 2, 2012

Ladybird Snippets

Ooodalolly! Time for June's Snippets of Story! I have plenty share, this being my June Crusade month and already about 5k words into it! :) All of this month's snippets are from Fly Away Home...the story I'm loving more and more. (and no--it has nothing to do with the fact that I am writing Mr. Wade Barnett for my own pleasure and to my own taste. ;) Without further ado, I present:

June's Snippets:

“I
have given complete authority over you to Mr. Barnett. You take your cues from
him now, and if he don’t find you satisfying, you’re out. Understand?” Shores’
balding head shone with perspiration, and a hot breeze wafted over us from the
open window down the hall.

“Perfectly.”
I smiled and fluttered my lashes like Ava Gardner. “Gee Mr. Shores, you’re such
a great boss—giving me this break and all. I just wanted to let you know how much
I appreciate it.”

“I’m
sending you on this job because you’re dispensable. Jules can’t be spared. I
already told you that. Now, if you’d stop blinking like a cat caught in a
sunbeam, I’d appreciate it.”

* * *

Mr.
Barnett drew near and perched on the edge of my desk. He fiddled with the
leather tassel on the clasp of my handbag. “Right-o. Shoot away. I’ll tell you
all I know."

“We’re
supposed to create a family paper?”

“So
Mr. Shores says.”

“News,
nonfiction, short stories, poetry, ads, or what?”

“A
bit of it all, I suppose. A cosmopolitan paper for the family fireside, if you
will.”

“Real
cute.” Real sappy, I said inside. I
twisted on my chair to see the time. Eight-thirty sharp. “So it doesn’t sound
like Mr. Shores has much of a plan.”

“Yours?”
That threw me for a loop. “But I thought this was one of the Post’s ventures.”

“It
is. I signed a contract last month to head up a new magazine for the Post. But strictly speaking, it’s a
personal venture; I wished to test a theory.”

* * *

He
shifted and bent to look into my eyes. I tried to hold his gaze but it was too
open and honest for me. I saw hopes written there, and dreams. I saw a soul and
it troubled me. I preferred the cold glaze so much of Manhattan wore—it saved
one the trouble being hurt.

* * *

“…in
every person, in every soul, somewhere there is a faint, long-lost glimmer of
childhood. However deep they might wish to bury it, however long it has been
hidden.”

* * *

Mr.
Barnett reached into the cardboard box and took out a stack of files. He
glanced at the writing on each with a concentrated frown and handed it to me,
smiling. I watched this play of expressions across his features and considered
him. He was not eccentric—he was too pleasant and good-humored for that. He was
not a crank. He was hardly even a bachelor—any more than I was an old-maid.
Long ago when my first guy dumped me I determined I’d never get married and I
would never be an old-maid. The two are not exactly inconclusive—I’d sorted it
out in my head this way: spinster-hood is more a condition of the heart than
the circumstances. I never planned to let
my heart grow bony elbows and graying top-knots and I certainly never planned on wearing spectacles—unless they were the
cutesy ones with the rhinestones on the side. No. I was no spinster, and Mr.
Barnett was not a hermit. That being decided, I filed the remainder of the
folders and pushed the drawer. It closed with the familiar crunching, rumbling
sound that never failed to make me feel productive.

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I'm Rachel Heffington; in varying degress, that will mean a dreamer, a writer, a people-lover, and a great many other things. I write chiefly because I read, and I read chiefly because the love of Story is writ on my soul and I cannot escape it. I hope I can inspire readers with an ache for that one Story of which we are each a part. I released my debut novel, Fly Away Home (available from Amazon and Barnes & Noble online) in February, 2014, and my short Cinderella retelling (The Windy Side of Care) is scheduled to be released in the Five Glass Slippers collection published by Rooglewood Press in June.
I am so pleased to make your acquaintance; do stick around and partake in the whimsy!